


Questions

by amanda_jolene



Category: My Mad Fat Diary
Genre: Cute, F/M, Fluff, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-21
Updated: 2014-07-21
Packaged: 2018-02-09 20:41:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,802
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1997103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amanda_jolene/pseuds/amanda_jolene
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Finn's got a pocket full of questions.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Questions

He’s got two baggies in his back pocket at all times now.

One has her name on it, one has his and they are both filled with little pieces of paper (although, hers is fuller than his at this point). It was a bright idea he had one night when he couldn’t sleep because at first he didn’t mind not talking but then he did. He couldn’t fill in the blanks of her minds by himself and she wasn’t offering any assistance and he had to do something or he would go mad trying to figure everything out. 

She tries to kiss him the next morning and he pulls away. “We need to talk.” 

A coy grin, a hand at the bottom of his tee. “This is better than talking, right?” 

He had never meant to imply that the physical aspect of their relationship was better than the emotional (they were tied so closely together, he couldn’t tell them apart, to be honest) but his words were biting him on the arse now. “No, it’s not.” 

It was a simple game, simple rules. At that time, he just had a baggie with her name and questions he had slaved over until his dad found him slumped across his desk. If she kissed him first, he got to ask one questions. Fingering and oral, that got him 3 questions. Buy her a drink? One question (but two if she were drunk and he could sneak the extra in). 

“You’re ridiculous.” But she had smiled and kissed him and he got to ask his first question, hand fishing in the bag, praying it was something good. 

“Alright. Questions is: who do you miss the most and why?” He almost throws the question down, almost calls the whole thing off, when her eyes start to well. “We don’t have to do this.” He tells her. “It were a dumb idea anyway.” 

“No, no. I just… thought it’d be like… what’s your middle name?” 

“I know your middle name.” 

She narrows her eyes. “How?” 

“I have my ways.” 

They are quiet after that. He figures the game is over before it really started (and maybe he shouldn’t do things at 2 in the morning because his brain was clearly full of half-cocked ideas) and he’s not about to press her into talking about something that has fouled her mood so completely he doesn’t think a tub of tea could make it better. 

“Remember how I told you I were in the hospital for a while?” She waits for him to nod, her knuckles turning white around the mug. “Well, when I was in there… I met this girl named Tix and we sort of became best mates. Worst match ever, really. She didn’t eat much and when she did, she’d make herself sick. Always counting calories… always moving. We sort of looked after each other, you know?” There’s a tremble in her hands and when he tries to touch her, she moves away. “Used to call her Fatty like it was funny nickname but now I wonder if I just played into her trap. The worse she could make herself feel, the easier it was to hurt herself. That’s how I used to operate, too. And then… I…” 

She closes her eyes and shakes her head as if all of this is too painful to think about and Finn has a right mind to tell her just to stop. He had just gotten her back, more than gotten her back, and he didn’t want to risk pushing her too far or too hard because his curiosity was getting the best of him. 

“Rae, you don’t have to-“ 

“I forgot about her, Finn.” There are tears leaking from the corners of her eyes and she sniffs. He takes her cup away when her trembles worsen and tea sloshes over the sides, and this time she lets him hold her, her face pressed against his chest. “I forgot her for a rave that ended up being a complete disaster. I were supposed to have dinner with her… and I was so caught up in being mad at my mum and being mad at Chloe for sending you that letter that I forgot the one person who never made me feel like shit. And she died. Because of me. Because I wreck everything.”   
She was falling back into the dangerous pattern of thinking, the one Linda had whispered about when he was waiting on Rae to come downstairs one night. It was a warning- watch out. Keep her safe from herself. Because beyond all the people who would do her harm, Rae was the one most likely to hurt herself. 

“I don’t think you can blame yourself for that, Rae. People die. It’s just a-“ 

“Part of life,” she finishes. “Everyone keeps saying that but she was 15. Kester said they found her on the floor. Had a heart attack because she had pushed herself too far. Having a heart attack at 15… people want to believe that’s natural?” 

“You couldn’t have know that she was going to…” he can’t say the word. “It wasn’t your fault.” 

“That’s the whole problem. Maybe me showing up wouldn’t have made a difference… but maybe it would have. It’s the not knowing that hurts so bad.” 

She doesn’t go to college that day and Finn stays with her until he has to go to work and he’s still thinking of scraping the game when he catches up with the gang at the pub and she passes him a baggie with his name on it, full of questions. “Hold on to that, yeah? I’m hopeless at keeping up with stuff.” 

That night, he kisses her twice and she kisses him once. The question he pulls out is dumb (“Why do you hate Spaceman, dickhead?”) and she tells him it’s a horrible, terrible song that she doesn’t hate as much as she used to because it was sort of, well, their song. He groans a bit and shakes his head. “I thought I was being clever and clearly it has backfired on me.” 

Her first question makes him blush. “What’s your full name?”

“Oh, come on, now.” 

“No, it’s only fair. Archie refused to tell me and it’s not fair because you know mine.” 

He mumbles it under his breath and she laughs, pets his cheek. “Cute.” 

“Shut up. Get on with the next one.” 

She pulls it out and her grin fades. “We don’t have to play this.” 

“No, go ahead.” 

Rae shifts nervously. “Where’s your mum at?” 

He figures this is one of those tit for tat moments the universe was always playing him with. He had asked her a question that made her cry and now he was sucking back nerves on this one. “Um, she’s in Canada.” 

She can tell by the tone of his voice, the set of his mouth and the way he leans away from her that this is one of those deeply personal topics that maybe neither of them was ready for. They don’t say much until he’s dropping her off and then he’s turning the car off and clearing his throat. “I, um, I was 8 when she left. She met someone at her office and I reckon they fell in love. Wouldn’t have hurt so bad but she just… sort of took off. Told me she’d come back for me when they got settled but she never did. S’pose it doesn’t matter much. Me and Dad tick along just fine together. Still… would be nice if she called a bit.” 

It hurts her heart because she had done much of the same to him. She kisses him first and he doesn’t keep tally on their game because for once, he just needs to be comforted. 

It doesn’t take them long to burn through their questions. Some of them are funny and stupid (“My dad said you came by one day and then lit out. Why?” “I saw your bum.” “WHAT?”)but a few of them… a few of them make him late for work because he can’t just leave her when she’s crying. There’s one that comes out (“What’s your biggest regret?”) and when she tells him about Liam, his gut clenches and he sees red. She’s afraid she’s told too much, afraid that he wouldn’t look at her the same but she’s relieved when he blurts out, “I can’t believe… he said you weren’t an oil painting? Has he ever… what the fuck is wrong with him?” (His anger at such a dumb comment is so endearing to her that he finds himself staring at her bedroom ceiling, biting his lip to keep from moaning too loud.) 

There’s no more questions in his bag and one left in hers. He skirts around it because he knows what it is and they’ve learned so much about each other, learned how to communicate without the questions that he isn’t sure this last one is even necessary anymore. Isn’t sure he wants to know. But she fishes the bag out of his jeans late one night (he wonders if Linda ever hears him sneak in) and hands it to him. “Go on.” 

He doesn’t have to look at it. “Why’d you break up with me?” He follows it with, “You don’t have to tell me.”

“It’s a bit complicated, I guess. I mean, it makes more sense to me now than it did back then. I just… I didn’t like myself and I couldn’t see how you could like me either. And I didn’t think it was fair that you… you deserved a normal relationship, you understand? I didn’t think I could give that you. I couldn’t get undressed in front of myself let alone some else. Especially you.” 

“It’s not about sex at all, Rae.” He’s not sure why it stings. He knew she hadn’t liked herself much, had figured that out on his way to Leeds but why would she ever think what he felt for her had anything to do with sex? “I just wanted to be with you.” 

“You say that now but what if I was still really mental and never wanted to have sex?”

“Well, that’s why I have hands, I suppose.” 

She laughs so hard that he has to clamp a hand over her mouth and whisper, “Your mum, your mum” as a reminder but he’s laughing, too. 

“You’re so vulgar,” she tells him. 

“You like it.” 

“But no, really. What would you have done?” 

Finn’s always been the honest sort and he cups her face in his hands and she knows by the set of his mouth that he’s serious. “I would have gotten used to it because nothing is worth losing you. Believe that.” 

And she does.


End file.
